Magufuli stops Kenya plan to hire Tanzanian doctors

President John Magufuli on Wednesday scuttled Kenya’s attempts to hire doctors from Tanzania, by ordering his administration to hire them instead.

The order to absorb 258 doctors he had allowed to come and work in Kenya was prompted by the legal battles in Kenya that have blocked their hiring.

The announcement came from the Twitter handle of Ummy Mwalimu, Tanzania’s health minister.

The minister later posted a statement in Kiswahili, providing a chronology of events and indicating that there may be disappointment among the Tanzanian doctors that the plan did not succeed even after they underwent a rigorous selection process.

HIRING 500 DOCTORS

“On March 18, 2017, a delegation from Kenya led by the minister for Health, Dr Cleopa Mailu, arrived in Tanzania and met President John Pombe Magufuli, the President of the Republic of Tanzania with the intention of hiring about 500 doctors from Tanzania,” he said.

They also had to be registered by the medical board of Tanzania, and not be government employees.

The agreement between Kenya and Tanzania was that the doctors would be allowed to travel to Kenya between April 6 and 10.

But doubts arose as medical associations in both countries and health experts questioned the practicality of the decision, ultimately leading to a court case.

According to the World Health Organisation, none of the three East African countries meets the recommended doctor-patient ratio of one health worker to 600 patients, an equivalent of 167 per 100,000 patients.

PROVIDING EMPLOYMENT

Tanzania, the most populous of the three countries with 53 million people as of 2015 and the largest, has only three doctors per 100,000; Uganda has 12 for every 100,000; and Kenya has 20 doctors per 100,000 people.

In the ministry’s defence, Dr Mailu told NTV in an interview: “There are associations and unions, but they do not run the government and each should stay within its mandate.”

He added: “The government has a responsibility to its citizens, including providing employment.”

Every year, Tanzania’s eight medical schools produce about 1,000 doctors. Very few of them get jobs. The Tanzanian government said it was open to offering another 500 as long as Kenya starts negotiations afresh.

The irony of life, Tanzania has a shortage of medics but can afford to send some of them to Kenya, which has a problem paying it own. Anyway I guess the hitch was man made after the Kenyan govt reached an agreement with its own medics beside this being an election year and such a move would portray the government in negative light.